"Do?" repeated Okhrim contemptuously. "Why, become a good Christian, and go to church and pay the Church dues. Ay! And drink vodka as other Christians do. I believe you Stundists are the greatest fools living. The child is to be brought up Orthodox, and if you won't do it, somebody else must. I'll take her myself, and if fair means won't 'tice her to church, there is always this." He cracked his whip, which he always flourished in his hand, and was not reluctant to use it on anybody he dared to tyrannise over. Alexis felt Velia tremble violently in his arms. "O Father," he cried, "if it be possible, save us from this hour!" "There you go," said Okhrim, with a sneer and a laugh, "as if God Almighty could hear you amid all His angels and archangels singing and chanting, to say nothing of the blessed saints. If I were in your plight, I'd pray humbly to one of the smallest saints, and get him to speak to those higher up; and maybe it might reach at last the ear of the Mother of God. Not that she'd do anything for a cursed Stundist. Besides, she'd never interfere with our archbishop and the consistory." "Can we do nothing, father?" cried Michael. "I must think," said Alexis, turning to him with an expression of almost hopeless anguish; "we have no power, no influence. Oh, if I had only sent Velia to Scotland with you, she would have been safe! But there are other fathers and other mothers. Oh, my God! Help us to bear it!" For once in his life Okhrim's conscience stung him, and he turned away, slowly passing out of sight. Alexis carried Velia into the house, and Paraska locked and barred the door, as if she could shut out the coming trouble. It was a sleepless night for Alexis, as well as for Father Cyril. The thought crossed his mind that he would have time to carry Michael and Velia to Odessa, and get his wife's kinsman there to send them away to Scotland. But a step like this would only precipitate and intensify the storm ready to burst, not only upon himself but upon hundreds of fellow Stundists in the district. There were other parents, even in Knishi, who would have the same most heavy cross laid upon them. They were not only to be bereft of their children, but they knew those children would be brought up in tenets which they themselves renounced with such fervour that they were willing to sacrifice everything rather than profess to believe them. No, he could not save Velia in that way. Then he thought pitifully of Tatiania, whose husband, Khariton Kondraty, had been in jail for nine months. She too would now have to give up little Clava, her youngest child, the pet and darling of the house. Poor Tatiania! Could she stand fast in her faith, so severely tried? Could any of the mothers refrain from going back to the Orthodox Church, if by doing so they could keep their little ones? Ah! This was the sharpest weapon of all in the Orthodox armoury. "Give me the children," the Church demanded, "and the mothers will follow."